Guest speaker, talent show conclude TSC’s Hispanic Heritage Month festivities

Texas Southmost College student Angel Ruiz won the Got Talent Show on Oct. 14, 2016 at the SET B Lecture Hall to close out Accessibility Awareness Week and Hispanic Heritage Month.

A packed house for Texas Southmost College special guest speaker Dr. Paul Hart’s lecture on Emiliano Zapata: Myth, Memory and Meaning, and a student Talent Show on Oct. 14, 2016 concluded TSC’s Hispanic Heritage Month celebration.

Author and Texas State University Associate Professor Dr. Paul Hart talks to a full house during his TSC Hispanic Heritage Month presentation on Emiliano Zapata: Myth, Memory and Meaning, on Oct. 14, 2016 at Tandy Hall.

TSC featured 10 events during Hispanic Heritage Month, which is celebrated nationally from Sept. 15 to Oct. 15.

“This is the first year since TSC reopened in fall of 2013 that the college has had a full schedule of events for Hispanic Heritage Month,” TSC Director of Student Life Armando Ponce said. “We’ve had a great response from our students and the community. We’re looking forward to adding more events for next year’s celebration to make this a TSC tradition.”

Dr. Hart’s lecture drew a standing-room only crowd at Tandy Hall, where his talk discussed an alternative view of the modern interpretation of Mexican revolutionary Emiliano Zapata’s ideology that included a brief summary of the Mexican Revolution and the events leading up to the death of Zapata.

“I was very happy to share and be involved in TSC’s Hispanic Heritage Month celebration to discuss the contributions of Mexican history and culture in South Texas,” Hart said.

Hart is an associate professor at Texas State University and author of Bitter Harvest: The Social Transformation of Morelos, Mexico, and the Origins of the Zapatista Revoluction, 1840-1910.

“Presentations such as these are a great benefit to TSC students and the community,” TSC History Instructor Dr. Brian McCormack said. “Our students had an opportunity to be exposed to some of the research being done in different parts of Texas and this presentation allowed for a more nuanced and detailed understanding of Mexican history.”

That same evening TSC student Angel Ruiz took first place at the college’s Got Talent Show with his renditions of Mexican ranchera genre songs “El Rey” and “Canción del Mariachi.”

Prizes were awarded to the top three acts participating in the Got Talent Show. The winners were decided through crowd applause.

TSC kicked off Hispanic Heritage Month on Sept. 15 and 16 with the Mexican Independence Day “El Grito” celebration at the ITEC Center, in partnership with the Mexican Consulate in Brownsville, followed by a “16 de Septiembre” student event at the TSC Campus.